OSWALD IN THE DOORWAY- the blog of the Oswald Innocence Campaign by Ralph Cinque

www.oswald-innocent.com

Tuesday, August 9, 2016

This song is another one from Paul McCartney's outstanding CD of old jazz standards Kisses on the Bottom. The name of the song is Home but because there are other songs with that title, it's usually referred to as Home (When Shadows Fall). The writing of it involved three people, but usually, it is attributed to Peter Van Steeden, who was born in Amsterdam, Holland. It came out in 1931. It is a very sweet, wonderful song, and for that reason, it has been widely covered. But, I want to mention one other artist who covered it beautifully, and he is Sam Cooke. Sam Cooke was truly gifted. He wrote beautiful songs. He sang beautifully. And, he also was a great musical arranger and stylist. He took other people's songs and made them sound better than they ever did before. And that's true in this case. I have a feeling that Paul McCartney took his inspiration from Sam Cooke in performing Home. Sam Cooke's tragic death by gunfire at the age of 33 was an immeasurable loss to popular music. But, this is my version of the song, and it involves some firsts for me. For the first time, I made use of the percussion program on my electric/digital piano; I added a drumbeat. I also added some strings because both Sam Cooke and Paul McCartney performed the song with a lot of strings. But, in addition, for the most part, this arrangement that I am playing is my own, and that's a first for me too. I bought an arrangement online, but they only show you the first page before you buy it, and I didn't like it. It didn't capture the feeling of the song. So, I rewrote it. I kept the key that it was in, which is F, but that's about it. But, in this recording, I am actually singing in the key of D because I transposed it down 3 half-steps. I had to lower it because I'm well aware that I have very little voice left, and the lower the better for me. So, after all that, I give you Home (When Shadows Fall). You've heard of comfort food? This is supposed to be comfort music.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_5O-LIMzkQ&feature=youtu.be